Understanding the urban life pattern of young people from delivery data

Young people are the backbone of urban development and an important pillar of social stability. The growth of young floating population in China has given rise to urban land expansion. Understanding the urban life pattern of urban life for young people benefits rational and effective land expansion. In this article, we introduce food delivery data into the process of exploring behavioral patterns of urban youth in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, China. The dynamic time warping (DTW) distance-based k-medoids method is applied to explore the main activity areas and activity patterns of the urban youth population. The results indicate that many young people from Hangzhou work in Internet companies, and most of work hotspot areas are observed in high-tech parks. The existence of overtime work is proved. Combined with the housing price data in Hangzhou, it is found that young people consider both housing prices and education environment when choosing where to live. The analysis combined with road network data reflects the planning characteristics of the city, also looks into differences between the actual city functions and the planning map. The proposed methods can provide useful guidance and suggestions for city planning.